Black Ogbu is mad black. As black as false intentions. Right now, his face is a funny mess, like someone bashed it in with an iron pipe and asked him to smile.
I no really like ciga, he says, flicking ash off his cigarette.
Difference dey? I ask, laughing. To me, smoke is smoke & the only difference is the smell.
He chuckles and glances at me like I’m young and innocent, like I don’t know anything. He’s correct. Those days, I didn’t. But for pictures, I didn’t even know what pussy looked like, not of what it tasted like.
He takes a puff and spits. One day, he says, you go know. He ‘ashes’ again, stares at the stick like he’s in two minds. Halfway to his lips he decides against it & flings it. Far away.
Na shit, he says. I need igbo.
It’s 40 degrees & I’m at the back of the class with a group of boys like me; sad-ass niggas with a history of hopelessness & truancy. I have a stick of Benson switch. It’s ironical how I don’t like it yet keep smoking it. One puff & that crap spins my head like dice and makes me want to take a quick, hot shit.
You gats calm down, Omo says. No be so dem dey smoke. Calm down!
I swear, I say. I know I gats calm down.
But I don’t mean it. That’s just me; once I start a thing, good or bad, I don’t stop. For now, my new habit is called Cigarettes & it’s back-to-back till my head feels like the world’s its playground.
Classes are over in a bit. I’ve learnt nothing & I feel insufficient. I go home, shut the windows, lock the door & bring out my laptop. I navigate through stacks upon stacks of folders, stop at the one titled “Apostle Joshua Selman sermons”, click, go straight to Cherokee D’Ass & Beauty Dior, press play and decrease the volume to the lowest. Then I ‘beat’ my meat till a powerful, knee-weakening thrill runs through me & erupts in a thick, creamy, hot mess. That’s how I deal with stress.
I need to stop this shit, I say. But I’ve been saying that since 2010.
The house is dark. The windows are shut. Bottles of lean are on the table & what used to be an ice cream cup is now our ash tray. Foli has shifted himself & his chair to a far corner because he says cigarettes smell like toxic, dead ghosts.
Make I tell you something about ciga after igbo, I say. Igbo be like sex; ciga na the cuddle, the Pillow Talk, you get? E no make sense to just fuck, get up, wear trouser, move ahead. Na ashawo character be dat. Ashawo vibes. You get?
He’s unimpressed with my analogy, but he tries it anyway and says it doesn’t feel like Pillow Talk one bit, that it’s more like an argument.
You’re just addicted, he says.
Addicted. I reject the word. Addicted isn’t for people like me. It’s for people like Whitney Houston, Amy Winehouse & Imafidon, the guy behind us who sold everything & his bed for blow.
I’m not addicted, I say.
That’s what addicts say, he counters.
You know I can stop if I want to, right?
Na the exact thing dem dey talk be dat, he says.
I get mad. From today, I swear, you no go ever see me smoke ciga again.
He sneers. Na so.
I pick up the packet of Benson and crush it and everything in it. Two hours later, I’m in my bedroom wishing I wasn’t so heady trying to prove a point to an idiot who, in my opinion, doesn’t even have his life together. What do I do now? Pheew! I pick up my laptop, navigate through stacks upon stacks of folders, locate the one titled “Christian Worship Songs: Volume 1” & click. There’s over 200 of them. Luna Starr, Rachel Starr and Alexis Texas are my choice today. I press play. Répétér.
At least you’re not cheating, I say. It’s one of the things I tell myself to feel less guilty.
Your heart’s messed up, Doctor Goodluck says. He’s the third guy telling me that. I’m just sitting there, staring at his name tag & wondering how a doctor has the guts to call himself Goodluck when his profession is all about delivering terrible news.
Plus, he continues, you have a hernia. You lift weights?
No, I say.
You smoke?
Sure.
Weed? Cigarettes? Blow?
I quit weed, I reply. I just burn ciggies.
How many? Like, packets.
On a good day, 1. On a bad day, 3. And there are lots of bad days.
He looks at me like he’s not surprised, but I know what’s beneath a poker face when I see one, and what I see now is pity, alarm and… yahcbkaooe, if you know what the hell that means.
You might want to stop, he tells me. Then he prescribes medications we both know I won’t take.
__
I go to Rukky’s that night. Not fair Rukky with the ass no different from her back. I’m talking Rukky with the fat ass that can pass for a planet. She’s on the bed, as high as expectations, naked, wanting. She lazily offers me a cigarette, the one from her lips. I shake my head. Nah!
Why? She asks.
I tell her.
Isn’t that what they all say? She says with a chuckle.
She gets up & walks over to me. Unbuttons my shirt. Leaves little circles and lipstick stains on my neck & chest with her lips & tongue. I can feel her lust accelerate from the submissive sounds in her throat, from the way she presses her warm body close to mine. Her hand is in my jeans now. Next thing I know, she’s jacking my belt, freeing it from the loop, from the punch hole, from the buckle. Bro, that’s one thing about Rukky; she always knows what to do in a crisis situation because, God, dafuq is dis?
Her cigarette is still hanging from her fingers. She would need both hands and a head to do what she wants to do next. I slip the ciggie off her fingers, chuckling.
What? She whispers.
And I tell her: Babe, there are few things as mind ‘blowing’ as taking a puff and getting a’head. Both puns intended.